More than any other countertenor, Bejun Mehta has persisted in exploring the mainstream song repertoire composed between the late-18th and mid-20th centuries – in other words, at a time when the countertenor voice was itself unfashionable and ignored. The programme for his latest recital could consequently be seen as an expression of both his methodology and intent. Opening in what is very much countertenor territory with songs by Purcell, he then passed beyond it to early-20th-century English song via Haydn and Beethoven.

Much of it was done with the kind of virile charm we associate him with. Mehta has always been able to communicate the pleasure he takes in singing, and when he launched into Vaughan Williams's Linden Lea, one was as much won over by his relaxed stance and the contented gleam in his eye as by the sounds he made. Some of it was wonderfully persuasive. No tenor, baritone or mezzo could quite produce the unearthly pianissimos with which he characterised Stanford's chilly La Belle Dame Sans Merci. His choice of Haydn songs, a group of English canzonettas written in 1794, was uninspired, although Beethoven's An Die Ferne Geliebte, its complex piano part superbly played by Julius Drake, was appealing in its sensual freshness.

Yet his voice has also been in better shape. Mehta's bronzed, distinctively masculine tone is still very much in evidence, but his voice has become bigger and now has a tendency to unwieldiness: a vibrato sometimes creeps in, causing notes to flatten. One hopes the problem is temporary, since he's a fine artist and, more importantly, a challenging one. But it detracted from what was otherwise a provocatively intelligent recital.